Russia and the West: The Root of the Problem of Mutual Understanding

I examine issues tied to the allegeddifficulties of mutual understanding betweenRussia and the West. I show that some of thebackground to these issues lies in thedifference of culturally grounded differencesin perceptual and conceptual schemata. In theWest, a broadly understood Aristotelianism andin Russia Neoplatonism designate dominantattitudes to the world. The Russian `lunar'consciousness, in comparison with the `solar'consciousness of the West, tends by and largeprecipitously to totalize the world, and theexperienced multiplicity of the real isreferred to its imagined center. The differencebetween Russia and the West, limited to somedegree by mutual similarities, can become thebasis of an axiological and intellectualdialogue important for one side and theother.